Kids Spelling Games

Change-a-Letter

Here’s a fun spelling game for your entire class to play. This game
requires players to think about vocabulary as well as spelling.

All you need are your students, a large white
board or chalk board, and markers or chalk!

Directions

Follow these simple instructions for second and third graders:

Divide your students into three teams. It’s not necessary to have equal numbers of students on each team.

Ask the students to line up,
single file, so that all three teams are the same distance from the
board. Assign each team its own section of the board on which to write.

Write a different 3-letter starting word in each section of the board for each team to use.

On your signal, the first player in each team comes to the board and writes a new word underneath the starting word that is different by just one letter.

When the first player has finished his word, he hands the chalk or marker to the second player on his team and stands at the end of the line.

The second player writes another new word that is different by just one letter from the word above it. Duplications are not allowed. Every word must be different.

Play continues until time is called. Players may go to the board more than once.

If a team gets “stuck” and can’t think of a new three-letter word, you may supply a new starter word so that the team can keep playing.

When time is called, score each team’s words.
Award one point for each word that is an actual word and is spelled
correctly. (Optional: Take away 3 points for every extra starter word
that you supplied.)

The winning team is the one with the most points.

Example:

Here is an example of a string of acceptable words: sit sat rat ran run fun fan fin win wit

Some good starter words are: top, pat, cap, big, red, hug, and most other c-v-c words.

Variation for grades 4 – 6: Play with 4-letter words. These are
much harder than the 3-letter words, so more starter words may be
needed. Good starter words include: line, tale, feel, mall, rate, lose,
boot, dull, and many others.